The Bhubaneswar Development Authority (BDA) is opening a one-of-its-kind competition inviting budding rock bands from schools and colleges to take part in the upcoming .FEST and get a chance to win cash prizes.

This first-of-its-kind “Bhubaneswar Bandwidth—City Rock Band Competition” invites budding rock bands of Bhubaneswar city schools and non-school and non-professional bands to perform live on .FEST stage which is being organised jointly by the BDA and Odisha Tourism.

The aim is to promote and encourage young budding talents enthusiasts of the city to showcase their musical skills as orchestra in the genre of rock band. The applicants can download the registration certificates from the BDA’s official website and sent the same for scrutinisation.

“We have received about 20 applications from schools and colleges so far which came both from government and private sectors. We will compile the applications and go for the scrutiny. The selected ones will be called for an audition on December 3 at KIIT Auditorium,” said Tapaswini Swain, who is coordinating the competition.

Following the audition, three top performing rock bands will be selected from the school level and another four best bands from college or non-school level who will get a chance to perform live on December 11 at .FEST venue, Exhibition Ground before a live crowd of about fifteen-thousand.

Four expert juries will judge the performances and declare results. The authorities have decided to felicitate the winners with attractive cash prizes. The winner in school level will get a cash prize of Rs 1 lakh, the runners up will get Rs 50000 and the second runner up will get Rs 25,000.

Similarly, in college or non-school level, winner will get Rs 1.5 lakh while the runners up will get Rs 50000, the second and forth runners up will get Rs 25,000 each. Moreover, it was decided that the winners from both the categories will be felicitated by the music trio of Bollywood Shankar–Ehsaan-Loy on December 16.

“It is a great platform and I am happy that the authorities have come up with such a noble initiative. It will help the budding musicians to much extent. The live performance will definitely boost their confidence. I hope more and more such events to take place and the talent will come out,” said Basant Sahu, a schoolteacher.